


Two Halves of a Miracle Make a Whole Family

by DjDangerLove



Series: A Family Made of Pieces [1]
Category: Iron Man (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Angst, Family, Hurt/Comfort, Parent Pepper Potts, Parent Tony Stark, Peter Parker Needs a Hug, Peter comes back from the Snap but doesn't feel like it, Tony Stark Has A Heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-18
Updated: 2018-12-18
Packaged: 2019-09-22 05:28:42
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,426
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17054039
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DjDangerLove/pseuds/DjDangerLove
Summary: Peter coming back from the Soul Stone and Morgan Stark being born are two entirely different things that belong to the same family.(Or a little angsty one shot that ends in a bit of Iron Dad fluff.)





	Two Halves of a Miracle Make a Whole Family

**Author's Note:**

> I'm still going to finish The Calendar Year, but I needed to write a little something different before diving back into it. Also, I just really wanted a story where Peter struggles with the appearance of Morgan on top of coming back from the Soul Stone. 
> 
> I'm leaving this in a series, because I've got some more Pepperony family one shots with adopted Peter floating around on my computer I think I'll post some time.

She came into the world on a night like this, on the back of raindrops and in desperate, loving hands. Impatient and demanding, but with a head of hair rivaling the color of sun kissed wheat. She cried in the shaking arms that held her, calmed under promises of never being let go. 

Despite being scolded by her mother for having a flair for dramatics like her father, she was swaddled in a boring brown blanket from the trunk of the car and praised for being so brave in her new scary world. A world that only existed because her father couldn’t let it die, couldn’t bear a life without all the things that no longer had any. 

Peter hadn’t been there when Morgan was born. He’d only met her when Pepper had a few months of her baby book filled in and Mr. Stark could tolerate being in the same room as him. She was perfect though and enough of the both of them that Peter could see she was theirs. _“Half a miracle,”_ Pepper had called her while explaining that Morgan didn’t wait until they were at the hospital to come. _“Four miles left, and she just couldn’t wait to meet us, I guess.”_

He couldn’t blame Morgan’s eagerness, knowing at one point he’d been just as desperate to know them. 

He had wanted to love her. He really did. He even wanted to be happy when Pepper had placed the four month old baby in his arms and she offered a gummy smile up at him even though he was sure he was holding her all wrong. 

The thing is, he hadn’t felt any of it. He’d just blinked at her until Pepper cleared her throat and took her back while uncharacteristically stumbling over the excuse that Morgan needed to have tummy time. 

He’d never held her again after that, always making excuses or making sure he was never close to the person holding her at an Avengers get together. He supposed he knew that it would backfire, eventually. That Pepper would force him into babysitting one night even though they had a person for that, and Mr. Stark could barely string a sentence in Peter’s direction. 

Now, Morgan is still in his arms, unmoving under the traveling rain outside and the colorful time stamped glow of the city reminding every one that Christmas was on the way. She had came into this world creating a chaotic mess, but seems to weasel her way out of every other one.

She’s plucked from his grasp, but it feels different from the first time like maybe if he could feel his arms he wouldn’t have wanted to let her go. Pepper holds her close instead, inspecting her for all the things they’ll hate him for. She has a bruise on her arm, and he’s pretty sure there’s blood on the onesie Natasha had made for her. 

“Hey! Look at me,” Mr. Stark says, like Peter has been the only one flexing his avoidance skills the past six months. He knelt down in broken glass, like he’s used to the mess that Peter exists in. “Stay with me, alright. Medics….Banner and Cho… they’re coming. Alright, Pete?”

Once rough and calloused hands, now just dry and cracked from the cold weather grab the sides of his face, thumbs brushing through something wet by his mouth. “What. Happened?” He demands, gives his head a gentle, but firm shake. 

“I didn’t….I didn’t let them…touch her, Mr. Stark. I swear. I tried to fight them off….I did…everything I could I just….maybe held her too tight…I don’t….I don’t know,” Peter tries to explain even though he can’t seem to catch his breath. 

“Woah, Pete! Hey, I know that. Morgan…she’s fine, okay? You did good.”

Peter feels the way his smile doesn’t quite fit in between Mr. Stark’s hands, feels the way his mouth doesn’t get it quite right. “She’s your miracle, Mr. Stark.”

“That’s not-“

“Tony,” he’s cut off before backing away as the world dissolves around him. Peter can’t blame him. He has Morgan and Pepper, and it’s almost Christmas. “They have to have room to work. He’s not good.”

He’s not. He knows he’s not, but saving Morgan’s life even if he doesn’t love her has to count for something, right?

—————-----—

Tony is surrounded by a multicolored glow, twinkling on a timer that can’t even stay in sync. The offset blinking from the illuminated garland is a bit nauseating, but he can’t bring himself to turn it off because he doesn’t want Peter to wake up on Christmas Eve in a cold, sterile med bay. For all the anxiety he’d had for Morgan’s arrival, he can’t help being selfishly thankful that she hadn’t been born into the hustle and bustle of a hospital room. He’s certain he only feels that way given how healthy both her and Pepper are, but he’s never going to share that with his wife because he will never be allowed to touch her again. 

He works the rough pads of his fingertips over his eyelids, rubbing at a tempo much slower than Chuck Berry’s Run Run Rudolph playing softly from the TV in the corner of the room while the McCallister family books it through the airport. He can’t imagine having that many kids, the anxiety he has from one is enough to last him a lifetime. 

There’s a soft knock on the door, one that seems odd given the medical staff’s propensity to barge in at any given moment. He’s trying to muster the energy to stand and meet whoever is slowly coming through the door at two a.m. when Pepper emerges from the opening. She’s trying to be quiet for Peter’s sake and now that she’s fully in the room, Tony can see that she’s trying to not wake the baby in her arms, as well. 

“How is he?,” she asks. 

Tony stands anyway, but makes his way over to Peter instead. He rubs the mint green blanket where the outline of Peter’s leg makes it wrinkle. 

“I’m told his light won’t be going out any time soon even though he was shanked with our tree topper,” he falls into the chair beside the bed, arm snaked through the rails so he can make sure the blanket isn’t tucked too tight under the mattress. “But for the record, I always did hate that star. This is why we shouldn’t have went the traditionalist route for Christmas.”

Pepper eases down onto the couch on the opposite side of the bed, rocking Morgan with a purpose Tony feels he should be wary of. “And are you only speaking towards the decor in our home, or the fact that I asked for a family outing on Christmas eve with my husband and daughter?”

Tony curls his hand around Peter’s ankle. “You know that’s not what I meant. I’m not blaming you.”

“She’s your kid, too, you know. Half the miracle, remember?”

He stands from his chair, fingers lingering on the cover until he has to let go in order to sit by his wife and daughter. He rubs his thumb over Morgan’s freshly washed baby hair. 

“He doesn’t know.”

Pepper pulls Morgan a little closer, rocking her gently so she will stay in dreamland while glancing at Peter’s medically sleeping form. “Because you thought he would feel guilty or you?”

“I just didn’t think it would help. He doesn’t…I thought he would be over the moon about her,” Tony whispers, leaning against Pepper in a way he hasn’t in a long time. “He’s….different from before.”

“I would be worried if he wasn’t.”

Tony stands again, anxiety building underneath his chest. He walks over to Peter’s bed again, pushes curls away from his bruised forehead. “I….it feels like …,” he trails off, unable to finish what is thundering beneath his heart, as if speaking it out loud will feel like being struck by lightning. 

Pepper comes to perch on the edge of Peter’s bed while passing off Morgan. “Hold her for second, please.”

Tony takes her in his arms, cuddles her in a way that feels like nothing in the world could harm her while Pepper holds Peter’s hand.

“I knew a guy that had a hard time living his life when he thought he’d seen the end of it,” Pepper says. Tony swallows hard, traces the upturned nose on Morgan’s face while committing it to memory to keep old ones from surfacing. He moves so that Pepper can wrap her free arm around his waist while she continues, “I don’t think the man knows it yet, but he has so much life ahead of him.”

He shifts Morgan to the crook of one of his arms so he can reach for Peter again. “I know now.”

———---------——

He comes back to the world through a kaleidoscope. Multicolored circles spinning in and out of focus. He twists his head, then his whole body trying to at least move with the world so he’s not dizzy. 

“Woah, wiggle worm. You’ll tear the stitches,” someone says as large hands catch his sides to keep him still. He stops following the kaleidoscope and the person gives his ribs a few gentle strokes. “You with me?”

“Yeah….if you’re in the k’leid’scope too,” he mumbles while grabbing at the person’s arms without opening his eyes, fingers bunching the fabric of their sleeves. 

“Those days are behind me, I’m afraid,” they chuckle. “Open your eyes, Pete.”

He does, but only because he wants to see who is stopping the world from spinning so he can thank them. He must have said it out loud because Mr. Stark’s face leans into his narrow field of vision while he replies, “Yeah, the drug induced Tilt-A-Whirl ride is my least favorite, too. I’m just glad we got you off the Scrambler in relatively one piece. They really whisked your insides, kid.”

He’s not exactly sure when they stopped by a theme park, but he hates that it feels like he missed out on the fun.

“Oh no, Spiderling, you were there. Front and center, for the one night only Break In at the Stark’s County Fair. You really shut the place down. Made me so damn proud.”

The memories pour over him like overflowing popcorn in a carnival box and he tries to catch the bits and pieces of the attack that seem the most important until he latches onto the one that makes him spill the rest.

“Morgan!”

“Woah,” the girl’s father says, but brushes Peter’s curls back from his forehead the way Uncle Ben used to do. “She’s fine, Pete. I promise. We’re all just worried about you. In fact, I’m pretty sure that last diaper change was her own way of expressing how shitty it is that her big brother is down in medical on Christmas Eve.”

“I’m-“

“..the other half of our miracle ,” Mr. Stark interjects before Peter can say anything else. “I…never got around to….well, a lot of things since you….you’ve been back, but one thing in particular is telling you that the night Morgan was born…I wasn’t there.”

Peter blinks more sluggishly than he wants to while he fists the blanket laying over top of him. “What do you mean? Pepper….didn’t make it to the hospital. She said you guys had to pull over…”

“Yeah, her and Happy. I still can’t believe….that’s not what I’m trying to say though. Point is, I missed the birth of my daughter because it was the night that we managed to bring every one back from the Snap, including you.”

Something settles heavy on his chest at that, more heavy than holding a five month old baby in his arms while being attacked by criminals looking for a score. “But Mr. Stark….she’s your daughter…how could you-“

“You’re my son,” and it’s said so fast he’s not exactly sure he’s heard the older man correctly until a bigger hand is laid over his and he sees Mr. Stark crouch down next to the bed so that Peter doesn’t have to look up to meet his gaze. “And I’ll admit, Pete, I missed out on a lot of things first time parents consider milestones with her but…at the end of the day, I figure I didn’t get to have them with you and I …”

There’s a silence that feels the room despite the beeping of medical machines and Kevin McCallister asking Santa for his family back instead of presents on the TV in the corner. 

Peter bites his lip, wincing slightly as his teeth find a cut there. Mr. Stark sighs into the room, openly tired in a way Peter has never seen him. “I love you just the same as her so it shouldn’t matter, right?”

Peter wants the warm feeling of being loved to swallow him whole, wants to squeeze Mr. Stark’s fingers where the man soothingly runs his thumb across the back of his, but he can’t, he shouldn’t, because “I’m not….,” he swallows the words he knows will only hurt the man in front of him, make him feel like every second he missed with his daughter to bring back the boy he knew was wasted, but there’s enough of something in his system that spews them back out anyway. “Something’s wrong with me, Mr. Stark. I don’t….I don’t feel like me.”

“You don’t remember this, you and the others- too out of it really to get a grasp on anything other than being out of that damn soul stone, but…Pepper forced medical to wheel her down to your room and….that night, our first night being…biological parents…we sat there holding our daughter and…holding onto you and I don’t know, Pete…We’ve never been one for miracles, but somehow in that moment we knew we had one in our little family.”

Peter wants to look away, but Tony’s hand in his hair keeps his head turned towards him.  
“We’re gonna get through this, kiddo. I promise you that. Whatever it is, Peter, I’ll fix it.”

And Peter believes him because he came back into the world on a night like this, on the back of raindrops and in desperate, loving hands. He was impatient and demanding, with a soaked head of hair. He cried in the shaking arms that held him and calmed under promises of never being let go. 

Mr. Stark never lets go.


End file.
